Art and science collide at CERN

CERN has had its fair share of great scientists pass through its doughnut-shaped halls, and it has also played host to and inspired artists like sculptor Antony Gormley, painter Patrick Hughes and photographer Andreas Gursky. The particle physics laboratory near Geneva, Switzerland, home of the Large Hadron Collider is now making its connection with the arts official: it is launching Great Arts for Great Science, its cultural policy for engaging with the arts.

The policy is designed to "put art and science on the same cultural level", says Ariane Koek, head of international arts development at CERN. To fulfil that aim, CERN has just announced its collaboration with the world-renowned cultural organisation Ars Electronica, appropriately themed "Origins".

Part of the policy is a forthcoming artist residency programme. Seeking out projects that are inspired by the research taking place at the facility, there will be two Collide@CERN residencies in different artistic disciplines in the first year of the programme. The unifying factor will be the calibre of the projects, says Koek. "CERN scientists are selected for their excellence and brilliance. The idea is that we also do some selective arts activity."

The residency scheme has a number of creative patrons, including Gormley, who has just donated one of his sculptures, Feeling Material XXXIV (2008), to the site. On Thursday, this will be hung in the main building at CERN, just outside the council chamber.

What successful applicants can expect from their residency is being kept under wraps until the official announcement on 2 September at Prix Ars Electronica 2011 in Linz, Austria, but Koek did tell CultureLab that the programme will be tailor-made for CERN. In a 2009 study, Koek found that scientists had previously felt very disconnected from visiting artists. To avoid history repeating itself, the new programme will have artists and researchers working closely together, so that the visitors become part of the CERN community.

The Collide@CERN programme will also respond to Koek's finding that artists in similar programmes at science institutions began to suffer creatively if the residency was too long: "I discovered there's a funny point, particularly with particle physics, where the artist loses confidence. When they're working with physicists, there's a tipping point where artists want to prove that they have the brains of the physicist, and the minute they do that they start to lose their artistic creativity."

Koek has also set up an advisory board, which among other duties will decide the fate of any unsolicited artist requests for CERN accreditation. This will take the form of a letter of approval afforded to a maximum of two projects per year. The discerning board members - Koek's "guardians of quality" - are cultural high-fliers on a par with the facility's director general Rolf Heuer, such as Beatrix Ruf, director of Swiss art exhibition centre Kunsthalle Zurich, and Serge Dorny, director general of the Lyon Opera House in France.

It's hoped that inspiration will be reciprocal, with scientists and artists paired up so that each will benefit from the other's world view, benefitting CERN's research as much as its cultural programme. The board will decide on which two artists to accredit when it meets on 24 October. The juries for Collide@CERN residencies will meet at the end of the year, with the projects getting under way at the start of 2012.

Oh, how fantastic! I wish more nuclear companies would do this all over the world!
How clever the art work shown with a control room panel and landscape photo integrated into a design!
As a visual artist who works within the nuclear industry, this is news I will be sharing with others. Thank you!